In Av-test's latest update on their testing of Microsoft's Security Essentials anti-malware product, they once again show Microsoft not quite reaching the industry average of detecting zero-day malware. Microsoft responds with its own information about it.

Av-Test is an independent research lab, as well as a service provider in IT security, that provides test results every two months on the state of malware detection. In their latest test, Microsoft's Security Essential failed to get certification based the their claim that MSE only detect 71% of zero day malware attacks. While MS only missed by 1% point, the last test result had them missing by 0.5%.

Microsoft has responded to the testing performed by Av-tests with the following statement:

"AV-Test's test results indicate that our products detected 72 percent of all '0-day malware' using a sample size of 100 pieces of malware. We know from telemetry from hundreds of millions of systems around the world that 99.997 percent of our customers hit with any 0-day did not encounter the malware samples tested in this test."

This brings up a good point. While we all want to be protected from the malware and other nastiness of the internet, if the average user has a .003 percent chance of actually being exposed to some of these malware attacks is it worth the cost of moving to a subscription based anti-malware solution? Post your thoughts.